His gaze is intense and scorching. “Do you regret it?” he asks quietly.
I’m not sure I can lie convincingly at this point, so I simply admit the truth. “I don’t know.” I wish he would put his shirt on; I can’t be sure that I won’t throw myself at him for another round with all that smooth tanned muscle on display.
“Come here.”
Luke takes my hand and leads me over to a beige leather chair. He firmly but gently sits me down in it and crouches down right in front of me, still holding my hand.
“I have no excuse for what I said to you that night,” he begins, looking steadily into my eyes. “I’m an asshole. I didn’t mean any of it, and I’ll apologize to you every single minute of every day until you forgive me.”
“You believed them instead of me.” My voice comes out in a whisper.
“No, no—Andi, look at me. I trust you—I’ve always trusted you. I never stopped.” He takes my other hand, squeezes both of them in his. “It was me I didn’t trust.”
“What?”
Luke exhales slowly, dropping his eyes for a few seconds. “For a minute there, I was afraid I was turning into my dad—obsessed with someone who was just using me. He was so in love with my mother, he didn’t notice that she didn’t love him back.”
He raises his head and our eyes meet and hold. My heart melts at the vulnerable boy haunting his expression. “She broke him apart, piece by piece—and he let her. I’ve always…I always swore to myself that I’d never let myself end up like him. Then, that night—”
“I swear to God, Luke,” I interrupt him, leaning forward. “I was only trying to help. I never should have gone to see your mother behind your back—and I really am sorry about that. I know I was way out of line, but—”
“No worries. I know you meant well.” He shakes his head, a hard smile on his handsome face. “I never should have doubted you. Deep down, I knew what Jess and Kat were saying was bullshit. I just…I fucked up.”
I stare down at our joined hands. I try to tug away from him, but he only tightens his grip on me. “I waited for you,” I say angrily. “You never showed.”
Luke’s expression is full of guilt. “I am so damn sorry, Tiger. I couldn’t face you until I sorted my shit out. I was fucking ashamed.”
I nod slowly, studying that amazing face of his. “Do you think I’m crazy?”
He shifts forward, letting go of my hand to cup my cheek. “I think you’re incredible.”
“Oh.” He didn’t answer me!
I give him a suspicious look, but he ignores it and tugs me to my feet. “I won’t leave you again, I swear. Whether you want me to, or not.” He lowers his head and presses a kiss to my forehead. “Marry me, Andi. I’ll do whatever you want. You tell me to quit—I’ll quit. I don’t give a shit. The only thing I can’t live without is you. Everything else is just extra.”
I gape at him stupidly. Then an incredulous laugh escapes my lips. “That’s a terrible idea,” I scoff. “Luke, your career is—”
“Fuck it.” He looks steadily into my eyes. “Marry me, Tiger. You can say no, but I should warn you—I’ll never stop coming after you until you do.”
I wish I didn’t find that roguish sparkle in his eyes so irresistible. For a second, I let myself imagine this perfect fairy tale world: me, Luke, and the kid, walking down the tropical beach at sunset. The slight breeze ruffles our hair as we celebrate successfully foiling an international terrorist plot.
Sounds far-fetched? So does any kind of happily ever after for the two of us. Smoke and dreams, Andi.
“It would never work. There’s too much working against us.” My shoulders rise and fall in a half-hearted movement. I look up at him with tears swimming in my eyes.
“It’s not just your fame. You think I don’t know I have issues? I know I do. But so do you. We’re reckless and irresponsible together, Luke. I don’t want to be that way anymore. I don’t want to fight with you every day because you won’t change. And I sure as hell don’t want to watch you live your life like you’re trying to die just so you can feel alive—and pray that you’ll come back to me at the end of the day.”
I feel exhausted after my little speech. I want to go lie down to recuperate, but Luke grabs my hand as I try to walk past him.
“Whoa; hold up.” He turns me to face him. His mouth is set in a frown. “I told you; I’m not trying to kill myself, Andi. I like my life, and I’m not afraid to live it. Do you realize how many amazing opportunities and experiences I’ve had because of what I do? I’d be crazy not to take advantage of every one of them.”
“Yeah, I get it.” I wave my hand spastically in the air. “You think you’d be missing out if you took a more cautious approach. But you know what? A full life isn’t all about excitement and adrenaline rushes. It’s about the people who love you and worry about you—the ones you leave behind when you find out one day that you can’t fly, and you come crashing back to earth. You can risk everything and tell yourself that you’re being free—but what you really are is selfish.”
Luke doesn’t say anything for the longest time. His green-gold eyes bore into mine, his face set in tense lines. I barely notice that I’m actually crying until he carefully wipes my hot tears away with a brush of his fingers.
“Do you love me?” he asks, his voice surprisingly gentle.
I exhale so deeply, my entire body seems to deflate. “My heart hurts without you,” I admit grumpily. “It must be love.”
“I need to hear you say it.”
“Fine.” I glare at him aggressively. “I love you—and I hate it! It’s the best worst feeling in the world. Happy?!”
A gorgeous grin breaks out on Luke’s face, as dazzling as the sun bursting out from the clouds. “It’s all I need, baby. Fuck everything else—you’re my adrenaline rush.”
“Really?” I take a step back and give him a skeptical look. “You’ll stop jumping out of airplanes and wrestling with alligators—for me?”
“Really,” he replies firmly. “I’ll get a nine-to-five job and become Mr. Boring if it means I get to come home to you, and have insanely hot sex five or six times a day.”
He smirks when I roll my eyes. I run my hands through my messy hair. Then I sigh. “I’m not going to ask you to give up your career, Luke. You worked way too hard for it, and it’s what you were meant to do. And I didn’t mean you should stop doing exciting things. Just…you know. Tone it down. A lot.”
“I can totally do that,” he assures me confidently. Then he grabs my hips and rocks me closer. “So, what do you say, Tiger? Marry me? I swear I’ll keep asking.”
“It’s not that simple,” I hedge, trying not to melt in his arms. “We still have lots of problems.”
Luke bends his knees a little so he can look me in the eye. “So, we’ll work them out together. We’ll go into therapy—whatever you want. Just say yes. It’s that simple.”
“Actually…it’s not.”
This is it. I’m going to tell him. I take another deep breath and look him dead
in the eye.
“Luke…you’re my father.”
He cocks his head to the side, confused. “Huh?”
Damn it. “I’m pregnant,” I mutter.
The smile doesn’t so much as fall off his face as freeze, and slowly slip away like a thief in the night. I watch his face transform into utter blankness. “What?” he says weakly.
I cross my arms over my chest. “Don’t act so surprised,” I say sourly. “We were careless, and you know it.”
Luke shakes his head slightly as if to clear it. “You’re pregnant?” he says, sounding dazed.
Instead of answering him, I walk over to the purse I had dropped near the door. I pick it up and do a brief search through it before coming up with the ultrasound picture I had brought. I march back over to Luke and stick it in his hand.
“I brought proof in case you don’t believe me. Because of that thing with Kat. That’s the head and the body; those little
stubs are arms and legs,” I point out to him because he’s just staring at the picture with a confused frown.
I give him a while to let it sink in. It was a shock to me, too, after all. When he finally looks up, there is a tentative smile on his face. He laughs disbelievingly. “Holy shit. That’s my kid in there?”
My hands automatically go to my stomach. “My kid,” I say possessively. “Yours, too. But mostly mine.”
Now there’s a full-blown grin on Luke’s face. He drops to his knees and reverently places his large hands over mine. “Are you okay? You went to the doctor?”
“I’m fine.” I remove his hands self-consciously. I don’t want to have to tell him that he’s touching bloat, not baby when he undoubtedly asks just how far along I am. “I went to confirm the pregnancy; I didn’t think they’d do an ultrasound. But the doctor said everything looks good so far.”
To my embarrassment, Luke glides his hands up my legs, lifting my dress up to reveal my belly. He looks up at me in awe. “I’m gonna be a dad!”
I frown down at him. “You’re happy about this?”
“Are you kidding? Hell, yeah!” He lithely jumps to his feet, sweeping me up into a deep and lingering kiss.
My head is spinning again. I put my hands on his strongly muscled forearms to steady myself. “Wait, I thought you didn’t want a baby right now? You said—”
“I didn’t want to have a baby with Kat,” he clarifies, grinning down at me. “I don’t love her; I don’t want to spend the rest of my life with her. It’s only ever been you. And now…Luke Junior.” He pats my bloat again.
I squint up at him. “Why are you smirking like that?”
He chuckles, putting his arms around me. “Because now you have to marry me.”
“Oh, really?”
“Oh, yeah. I mean, come on—you’re knocked up. I’ve gotta make an honest woman out of you.”
I roll my eyes at him but I have to admit that his excitement is infectious. But one of us has to the adult here. “It’s going to be really hard,” I warn him. “You think you hate the media attention now? Wait until—”
Luke places a hand over my mouth to shut me up. He gazes at me with bright emerald eyes melting in gold fire. “Have faith, Tiger. We’re a family—no matter what. We’ll take care of each other.”
It takes me a few seconds before I can talk. I take a few steps back. “I’m crying right now because of the hormones. Not because I’m—I’m really, r-really happy.”
He laughs and goes to comfort me, but I hold a finger up to indicate that I need a minute. He waits patiently for me to compose myself. I take my time, quickly wiping my cheeks while flushed with mortification. Instead of morning sickness, I have crying sickness. The other day I wept at a cat commercial. I don’t really like cats.
“Okay,” I say, smoothing back my hair. I narrow my eyes at him. “If I do this, just know that if you ever cheat on me I will maim you. Not badly enough that you can’t raise our child while I’m in prison. But enough that you won’t be walking the runways during Fashion Week again, pretty boy.”
Luke considers this, shrugs. “Sounds fair. Anything else?”
“Yeah.” I walk back up to him and poke him in the chest. “If we make it legal—it’s for life. You are stuck with me forever. And if you grow tired of me, or bored with me…or scared of me—too bad! Just remember, you asked for this.”
“Is this going to take much longer? Because if so, I’m going to need you to take your clothes off.”
“Baby—no.” I laughingly fend him off when he hooks a finger in the neckline of my dress and peeks inside with an exaggerated leer. “We need to talk about this!”
“What’s there to talk about?” Luke shrugs again. “You want my loyalty and you want forever. Sounds good to me.”
“Just like that?”
“Yeah, just like that,” he agrees. “It’s the simplest thing in the world, Tiger. It’s you and me, and Luke Jr. That’s all I need. We’ll see about getting a brother or sister for him somewhere down the line.”
“But—”
This time he silences my objections with a kiss. I’m more than happy to sink into it, like a junkie finally getting her fix. We’re well on our way onto round two when Luke suddenly pulls back with a sexy smirk.
“So, Anderson Kelly…you gonna marry me, or what?”
Smiling, I look up at his beautiful famous face. My secret celeb crush.
I take a deep breath.
Epilogue
I wish I had known that being pregnant makes me seasick before I decided to get married on a boat. Fortunately there were very few people present to witness me projectile vomiting between reciting my vows. The boat’s mine, by the way. My birthday present from Luke. We named it Black Hole. Boy, do people look at you weird when part of the name is covered up.
Yes, I am officially Mrs. Movie Star. No, we haven’t formally announced it yet. Luke wanted to let it slip during his appearance on a popular talk show—but I want to keep it quiet out of spite. Like my pregnancy, everyone suspects but no one can confirm.
The press and I have a love/hate relationship. They rarely catch me outside of work-related events with Luke. I’ve obtained mythical white whale status. The few times they do catch me in a candid moment, like coming out of an Arby’s or looking up at a tree, all their pictures seem to come out blurry. And before they can surround me like a pack of wild dogs, I manage to fade into the background without a trace. It’s like I have evil powers. I’m intrigued that I might.
I’ve become somewhat of an internet sensation. Maybe not in a good way, but I’m a big girl—I can take it. My pained expressions and blunt responses when an interviewer’s microphone is turned on me are fodder for memes around the world. In a way, with my pathologically thick skin, I am oddly suited to being the wife of an A-list heartthrob. Anyone else would be reduced to a puddle of paranoid self-loathing by now.
You’d think I’d hurt Luke’s reputation by being myself—but if anything, he’s more popular than ever. His new publicist, an enthusiastic young guy named Vaughn, is scared of me. Guess he heard what I did to his predecessor’s car that one dark and stormy (in my recollection) night. Speaking of Jessica—we’ve decided to call bygones on past events. I’m learning to forgive people, and I’m finding that it gets easier the more you do it. Anyway, she’s actually trying to take me under her wing—and even wants me to come work for her. She thinks I’ll be an asset in the business. I have no idea how she came to that conclusion.
In addition to preparing for the arrival of my son—Anderson Jr.—I’ve been busy starting up Luke’s new charity for foster children—Find a Kid a Star. FAKAS for short. Don’t say the acronym out loud, though—it doesn’t sound right, as Nate so helpfully pointed out.
Speaking of Nate, guess what? He finally got himself a girlfriend! Guess who? No, not Kat. Even better. Amber Lynn Carver! Luke’s mother. How messed up is that? The weird thing is that they’re really good together. They seem to keep each other grounded and happy. They asked for Luke’s blessing, of course. He told them he didn’t give a shit. I’m just glad that Nate’s legal. Ha, what if he ends up as Luke’s stepfather, and my father-in-law? Luke doesn’t think it’s funny, so I try not to laugh about it in front of him. Amber Lynn and I barely get along. Just know that I will never that woman near my kid without close supervision.
Life’s not perfect, but it’s getting close. How could it not be? I’m in love with the sexiest, most talented, and most incredible guy on the planet—and by some miracle he loves me back. An insulting number of people have asked me how I did it. How did I manage to snag a megastar like Lucas Greyson? I never give an honest answer because the truth is…I don’t know. Maybe I’m not enough of anything to everyone else, but to Luke I’m enough. And that’s everything.
So, yeah, my life is pretty damn amazing right now.
And, also…
Kat Vandevere, you can suck it.
That is all.
&n
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CELEB CRUSH Page 36